Passionate about education

Jessica has conducted over a thousand workshops for hundreds of public school students and adults for Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Caramoor, the Little Orchestra Society, and the Orchestra of St. Luke’s. Currently, she is most passionate about getting young classical musicians off the page to activate their own creativity, improvise, and awaken their own inner composer well before their college years. Her most recent engagements have been for the National Youth Orchestra of Carnegie Hall and for the North Carolina Chamber Music Institute.

She is also a music specialist for The Juilliard School, where she visits the Nord Anglia schools in Dubai, Abu Dhabi, and Qatar to work with music teachers as they implement a more inquiry-based pedagogy into their curriculum. Students then engage in more creative/reflective activities while learning instruments/general music while Ms. Meyer models life as an artist and leads them in performances/activities where they also embrace their artistic selves.

Ms. Meyer is committed to presenting workshops and coachings that empower fellow musicians with networking, communication, teaching, and entrepreneurial skills so they can be the best advocates for their own careers. Her workshops have been featured at The Juilliard School, the Curtis Institute of Music, the Manhattan School of Music, the Longy School of Music, NYU, for the Teaching Artists of the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Chamber Music America Conference, and at various universities around the country.

Jessica is also often hired as a catalyst to help forge better relationships between arts organizations and their surrounding communities. For Carnegie Hall, she worked with community organizations in New Orleans and El Paso as part of their Play USA partnerships, and she also facilitated the #Quartweet Residency between the Princeton Symphony, the Signum Quartet, the Isles Youth Institute, and surrounding elementary schools.

She can regularly be found at the Caramoor Center for Music as part of their two-day residencies entitled “What’s in a House”, a series of workshops where students compose music based on rooms of the famous Rosen House.

REVIEWS & TESTIMONIALS

Most notable of all, though, is Meyer’s bravura playing…..is by turns fierce and lyrical.

Perceptive, positive, proactive, productive, pragmatic and thoroughly professional; that is how I describe Jessica Meyer’s approach to living as an energetic and caring musician in today’s world. Her intelligence and effervescent personality truly inspires and leads us to be our best selves.

Heidi Castleman, Viola Faculty – The Juilliard School

Jessica Meyer is a teaching artist of the highest order. The same sophistication, accessibility, generosity, fun and clarity we celebrate in her musicianship radiates from her work as an educator. She innately understands teaching and learning in and through music, and has developed her skills to such a high degree that she can apply them to a wide variety of settings and audiences—lighting up a workshop, a classroom, and even an audience with her interactive concerts. If you want to see what a great teaching artist can do, hire Jessica and then stand back.

Eric Booth
National Arts Learning Consultant, Author of The Music Teaching Artist’s Bible

Articles by Jessica Meyer

I loved writing this article about my love for new music and my journey while partnering with living composers. Furthermore – all the great composers we admire were players and improvisers themselves….perhaps we should all embrace their inner Bach, Brahms, and Beethoven and start writing/improvising from time to time?

​I found myself composing again after many years in response to the emotional trials of being a parent. In this article, I encourage other parents to create moments for themselves when they are truly in a state of “flow” while making stuff up.​

I was asked to write an article for the Journal of the American Viola Society about what advice I would give those starting a career in music. I feel these tips should be embraced way before graduation…I so wish I had them then. Please pass them along to those still in school.